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Should we force Scouts to listen to Old Goat music ?

04-30-2014, 09:38 AM

At our district camporee this past weekend the evening gathering included a 20 minute speech and Q&A by a young Scouter followed by a rock concert. The music was a local 80s & 90s cover band fronted by a District Scouter. For the most part I liked it, some Scouts did not and wanted to leave. When Scouts got up and tried to go back to their campsite the Campmaster would force them back. "Boys go sit back down. I am the Campmaster and I said go sit down". A Scout is courteous but let's face it the music was not relevant to these boys, it was "Dad's music". When I was a teenager I would have been bored to tears having to sit through a bunch of "Dad's Music", when it was my weekend. Even if the music had been relevant to this generation who are we to force a Scout to sit through something they don't like. I know if a Scouter had forced me to sit through a Country, Rap or most current Pop Tart music I would have ripped up my training cards and walked out of the program right then. Who is out of line here ?

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Son #1 and his buddies listened to mostly 80s music, so if the band was good I doubt it would have been a problem.
Son #2 was with our crew this fall at a council camporee that included a decent local country western band, laser show, and fireworks. They were delayed because of rain, and one of the girls was getting chilled, so he and another fellow and female youth requested to go back to camp (which was a mile away, but there was an adult hanging back there). I had no problems with it.
I can imagine a patrol of younger boys wanting to make similar adjustments.

So my opinion: as long as the boys were still being accountable to their adult leadership, the Campmaster was out of line. If there was a safety issue, he should have had the courtesy to explain it.

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Once again, fun is sapped out of the program because of adult programming and adult rules. If my boys want to head back to camp because the camporee program is bad, then whether I like the program or not, we're heading back to camp. A SM has a responsibility to be courteous to his boys as well, after all if they are boy-led, they're making the decisions. This is not a hill I want to die on. In my troop rule #3 out of 3 is HAVE FUN. If they aren't having fun, they're breaking troop rules. They trump council program rules any day.

By the way, Old Goat music from the 80's and 90's???? OMG, I must like really Old Goat music, because I would agree with the kids, the stuff that came out of the 80's and 90's is really bad.

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I find it’s pretty common that the adults who are planning these types of events just cannot handle the idea of the program having either an extended open/free or truly “optional event” block of time.

I ran into this at a District event where they were showing a movie as the last activity on Saturday night. My scouts wanted to go out and play capture the flag and its variants, and I said sure. Several of the scouters organizing the weekend, all friends of mine, got kind of upset. They had put a lot of time and thought into their planning and felt it was rude and disrespectful to not participate. I explained that we came out to the woods to get away from electronic entertainment and I really couldn't order my scouts to sit and watch a movie.

Several months later during the planning for another event I suggested that they just leave Saturday evening open for the scouts to run around in the woods --- they really just couldn't handle the idea of not scheduling something.

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I can sympathize with both sides of this. Rock band? Yeah, I'd let my scouts go back to camp. Their choice.

How about the Sunday night camp fire program at summer camp? Includes information. Recognition. OA callout. We strongly encourage our scouts to go. But if they are set on returning to camp, I don't think we'd stop them. But depending on what my guts says about the situation, we may send two adults back to camp too.

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Yeah, this is why camporees suck. My suggestion to our district activities committee was a gathering of district SPLs and let them come up with the program. I was basically called a communist and dropped from the email list. I have no problem with a concert -- who says campfires have to be built around stale jokes and lame skits? But it needs to be music the Scouts plan with the adults running for cover and/or earplugs.

And someone tell me why the camp master is telling Scouts what they can and cannot do? If I'm okay with the Scouts in our unit heading back early, it's none of his dang business.

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The Campmaster is out of line. I would have loved the music, and I think so would my sons (they've had to listen to it as long as they've been alive). That said, the call of whether or not to leave that area is up to their SPL and their SM.

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Kind of funny, but I have a number of times had 16ish scouts in the front of the van tuning the radio, and more than a few times they end up on oldies or classic rock. Cannot get them to put on classical though.

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Kind of funny, but I have a number of times had 16ish scouts in the front of the van tuning the radio, and more than a few times they end up on oldies or classic rock. Cannot get them to put on classical though.

Brilliant! That's how you get them to WANT to move their campsite 300' away. Blast Classical !

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Did a summer camp in the south. The chaplain had a service which was VERY Christian, if you know what I mean? Our small troop is pretty mixed, especially for our neck of the woods, and many guys got uncomfortable. So we allowed them to go back to camp with two adults. Spoke to the CD later just to let him know.